The Museum Makers: A Journey Backwards

This is a well written and interesting volume. It seems somewhat in the current Zeitgeist to find a suitcase of memorabilia under your bed. Rachel Morris's is more intriguing than most. Its contents are explained with reference to a genealogical diagram. She comes from a family of eccentrics, bohemians and adventurers. The male members are particularly dodgy and the women heroically inspiring.Morris explains the value of tangible objects of all kinds in stirring her imagination. She has become an active trustee of several prominent museums and archives. The reader is given detailed and jolly histories of these. They are also well referenced.The photographs include her sensitive and deeply loved grandmother. The illustrated chapter headings tell of her father, the unfortunate Guido Morris who founded The Latin Press in post-war St Ives.Altogether a splendid satisfying read.

I loved this book and can't recommend it enough. Rachel Morris skilfully weaves her own story into her account of museum making and, in doing so, eloquently makes the case for why museums matter. Vivid, powerful and poignant, this beautifully written book shows how we can all be museum makers.

A family memoir and a history of the development of museums. I think I would have preferred it being one or the other. 3.5 from me.

Fascinating. Explores the relationship between objects, memory and stories. Woven through with the stories of the authors family and life. Beautifully written captivating read.

When you can't go to a museum, let the museum come to you!

Great

Subtitled ‘A Journey from Dark Boxes of Family Secrets to a Golden Era of Museums’, the book is described as part memoir, part detective story, part untold history of museums.The author argues persuasively that objects have the power to evoke memories more strongly than words alone. Not just because they can be experienced via other senses, such as touch, but because they provide a more direct link to stories. The author’s passionate belief in the power of stories comes across as she talks about them making objects “glint with light” and helping to “set them moving in our imagination”.The book traces the transition from 19th century national museums “devised by history’s winners” to the museums of the 20th century aimed at telling the stories of “the underdog, the poor, the dispossessed, history’s losers”. In doing so, Rachel Morris addresses topics of contemporary debate, such as the racism and colonialism associated with the acquisition and display of some objects in museums.In uncovering and collating the stories that constitute the author’s family history, it helps that it is peopled with characters such as the Free Lover and the London Aunt. The person who features most prominently, and memorably, in the book is Gran, one time romantic novelist and curator of most of the family’s stories. Those stories involve family scandals, illegitimate children, mistresses and the author’s rascal of a father. The latter gives rise to the detective story alluded to in the blurb.Being a fellow book lover, one of my favourite chapters was the one in which Rachel Morris discusses imaginary museums in books (and film). To her list of suggested titles, I’d like to add Meet Me at the Museum by Anne Youngson, The Signature of All Things by Elizabeth Gilbert, Behind the Scenes at the Museum by Kate Atkinson and The Museum of Broken Promises by Elizabeth Buchan.The Museum Makers is a fascinating book about the history of museums and museum-making. In picking out some of her personal favourites, Rachel Morris reveals herself to be drawn to the small and/or curious, such as the Pitt Rivers Museum in Oxford. But what makes the book even more interesting – and poignant – is the author’s childhood memories and her desire to tell the stories of the (often long-suffering or overlooked) women of previous generations of her family. In this respect, the family tree is useful for navigating the complexities of the author’s extended family and there are some wonderful photographs to help bring those people to life.I can’t do better than echo the author’s own description of The Museum Makers as being the ‘catalogue’ for her museum – “a quirky, unconventional, very personal catalogue”. I hope her fears for the future of museums, especially small local museums, due to loss of local authority funding prove unfounded.

The synopsis of The Museum Makers tapped into that part of me that is fascinated with family history, both my own and other people's.Rachel Morris is a museum maker, responsible for some amazing displays and museums. One day, after a chance visit to a museum that stirs something within her, she is compelled to pull out from under her bed various boxes of family items and papers that she hasn't looked at for years. This prompts her to pull all the threads together, look at her family's past and collate it as she would for a museum collection. I think there's nothing quite like exploring family archives and I enjoyed this aspect of Rachel's journey very much.The book combines family stories with interesting facts about museums, both large and small, both British and further afield. For me, it was the family stories that stood out, that engaged me the most, that made me consider just how much of the past stays hidden and how little rises to the surface for future generations. It's so important to record them if at all possible.Morris has an appealing writing style and I found her tales of her gran, mum, dad, and other family members so absorbing. This is an informative book for anyone who has ever visited a museum and wondered how all the artefacts found their way there. It's also the perfect read for those who like delving into social history. It's quite a short read but it's absolutely packed with detail to enthrall the reader.

Fascinating and moving family story